Lao Airlines plane crashed into the Mekong River in the southern city of Pakse, near the border with Thailand, just before 16:00 (ICT) on Wednesday.

The state-run Lao Airlines said in a statement that the plane took off from the capital Vientiane and “ran into extreme bad weather conditions” as it prepared to land at Pakse Airport.

AP reported that 17 of the victims were from Lao, seven from France, five were from Australia five from Thailand, three from Korea, two from Vietnam and one person each from Canada, China, Malaysia, Taiwan and the United States.

The airline said it had yet to determine reasons for the crash of the ATR-72 aircraft which was virtually new and had just been delivered in March.

Please click the photos for large images:

In this undated photo provided by the Rhodes family, Phoumalaysy Rhodes, second left, and her husband Gavin Rhodes, right, hold their children Manfred and Jadesuda, second right, near the Sydney Opera House in Sydney, Australia. The four are among 49 passengers and crew believed killed when a Lao Airlines plane crashed on Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2013, en route from the Lao capital Vientiane to Pakse in the Southeast Asian nation’s south. (AP Photo/Rhodes Family)